A lot of people may not know, but the
Osumi has a very old history. One reason may be because the castle of the Shimazu
Clan, a feudal warlord clan in Japan, who ruled Satsuma-han Domain, was located
in the Satsuma Peninsula side.
The place name Osumi first appeared in “Shoku-nihongi”,
a history book complied by the Imperial command and it said that the Emperor
Genmei ordered to separate “Kimotsuku County”, “Soo County”, “Osumi County” and
“Aira County” from “Himuka-no-kuni (kuni means a former local administrative district and former name for Miyazaki)”
to create “Osumi-no-kuni” for the first time in the 6 year of the Wado era.
The six year of the Wado era is 713 A.D. So Osumi-no-kuni
was created after only 13 years from the establishment of the “Taiho-ritsuryo”, first full-blown
legal code of the Nara era.
Actually this year is 1300 years anniversary of the
compilation of “Kojiki”, which is the Japanese first full-blown national
history book, compiled by the Imperial command in 712 A.D. So next year is the
1300 years anniversary of the establishment of Osumi-no-kuni.
Now this area has a population of about 250
thousands people. I guess even people in Kagoshima City don’t know about the Osumi
well enough except to say that this area’s main industries are agriculture and animal
husbandry and there is a space center. Furthermore, a guide book, which has about two
hundred pages, allocates only three pages for introduction of the Osumi.
I believe that the Osumi area is a
wonderful place. So, I would like to introduce how wonderful this area is in
this.
